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Scientarian Revolution
The Scientarian Revolution was a multi stage, cross continent event that completely overhauled Gernon history, and marks year 0 on the Scientarian Calendar. First Attack on Kuroseki Kuroseki is where the main brunt of the Scientarian forces attacked. The actual army only numbered 1000 Scientarians, but the first assault was a quick assault to take the city, not a full battle. Many of the soldiers were elves from Alek Tellumnar's home in the Silver Tree Forest, but many as many as a hundred humans and a hundred gnomes may have been part of this first assault. The attack began with several platoons in various sections of the city starting massive firstorms with alchemical fire and bombs to distract the Kuroseki guard and populace. For several hours the city was unaware that any attack was occuring, only focusing on putting out the fires, but the top brass quickly noticed from reports that new fires were springing up where they made no sense, and declared that there was some unknown threat attacking the city. The King was brought to a defensive chamber for extra protection. Alek and an elite group of his 10 closest managed to penetrate the central district by silently killing the guards at one of the twelve gates, and using a powerful acid mixture to burn through the defensive gates. The group found their way into the palace, and through expert use of explosives on the defensive chamber by alek himself, all but the king were killed. Leaving King Hurin in the hands of his soldiers, Alek left to take to the Walls of Kuroseki. He announced in his commanding tones that the King has been captured and for the men to lay down their arms. Some did, some tried to kill alek, most died. Many tales abound about this slaughter in the central district, with explosions raining down from all over. Many of the tales include events where Alek was run through with a sword, pulled the sword out and stuck the knight who had attacked, and continued to fight. Several nobles have told stories of seeing Alek walk into a crowd of soldiers, ignite several bombs on his person, and walk away unscathed. By the end of several hours, almost all of the Scientarians in the city had made it to the central discrict, and kept control over that part of the city. After the battle, it was found that only 7 scientarians died during the attack. King Hurin was forced to sign a document that would be read for the city to stand down while the Scientarians were in control, and for the Dwarf King to stay away from the city. Many of the city's people left during the massive firestorms, and a somewhat ordinary time followed for the month after. The Raising of the Alliance to Restore King Hurin The city of Kuroseki had been a home for the Dwarves in Exile for 10 years since the begining of the infernal wars. Many of the Dwarves living in the city left when the Scientarians managed to take the city, and went to join the King and the army. It had been Kuroseki policy that no standing army could stay within 200 miles of the city, so the main brunt of the Dwarven army stayed in a satellite city to the east called Heroda. It was located in the mountainous heights on the high plateau Kuroseki is built on. As soon as the Dwarven elite learned that their allies had been attacked, and that the Dwarven quarter had been bombed more than the other parts of the city, the Dwarf King Rhys Quarvin decided that they must help. They decided to appeal to other nations for help, as no force of less than 70,000 had a chance of breaching the central discrict when the enemy was expecting a counterattack. A group of 3000 was sent to southpoint to try and buy mercanaries from the hardy northern stock.The force left the brunt of the army in Heroda, about 30,000 men, and brought 6000 cavalry to ride to Coralis and appeal the people of the Dorry Hills. Along the silver road to Coralis, about 3000 assorted sellswords, dwarves, and people of justice joined the army detatchment. There was one major event that nearly escalated into a battle between scientists in Shiron and the magically alligned dwarves, but some of the new recruits managed to stop the battle from becoming deadly. Once the force arrived in Coralis, deliberations with King Edmund Balor of the Dorry Hills, a halfling, were harsh, but better than expected. With only the concession that the Dwarves give favorable trade relations with the Dorry Hills, and a concession to the patriarch for the Dwarves to accept their theological position that creation began at the rock of Coralis. The King recognized that his people may not accept these concessions after the battle, but knew how much he needed the Dorian's help. As the agreement was sealed, a force of 25,000 assorted soldiers (mainly infantry) and 2000 clerics left with the Dwarves back toward Kuroseki. The force moved at a much slower rate on the return trip to account for the footmen, and all regrouped with little worry at Heroda. About 5000 extra men had been purchased from southpoint, thus bringing the size of the army to approximately 71,000. Events in the South A completely seperate campaign to annihilate the center of magical authority, the Institute for Magical Learning in Sephora, took place during Alek's work in the west. There had been longstanding resentment for magic in the south due to the Institute's control over much of the local politics, and the disdain many of them had for the unlearned poor. Adele Tellumnar (democratically elected leader of the powerful liberal, scientarian, youth faction of the Silver Tree Forest elves) had placed hundreds of spies and soldiers in Sephora to prepare for a coup, when a perfect opportunity came up. A group of adventurers that burned part of the Silver Tree Forest had also run afoul of the Sephoran government for killing a local ruler and were about to be executed with many of the Institute's council in attendence. A small battallion of elves uninvolved with the revolution had also made it to Sephora to attempt to kill the people who had caused such a terrible wild fire, and were contacted to be a part of the attack, so long as they could kill the arsonists as well. A different group of Scientarians made contact with the adventurers in their cells, and enlisted them to assist when the coup began. During one of the Archchancellor of the Institute's long winded speeches, the coup started. Adele herself made the first move, using her own invention, a high quality spyglass mounted to a rifled gun, to assassinate the Archchancellor. The Institute had long established their contempt of firearms and alchemy, and obviously never accounted for an attacker that could use a gun to kill from such a long range. The Scientarian agents, the elven group chasing the condemned prisoners, the wizards, the Sephoran guards, and the adventurers all began to fight. The night before many explosives experts were assigned to plant charges at strategic locations, and as soon as the death of the archchancellor was reported, the institute was utterly and completely demolished. After another 10 or so hours of fighting, Adele managed to gain support of the greatest Spicer Guild, and take control of Sephora. The Battle of Kuroseki Though technically the second set of fighting to occur in the great city, most people who refer to "the" battle of Kuroseki are referring to the events that took place when the Alliance led by the Dwarf King attempted to take back the city. The force of approximately 71,000 soldiers marched straight on the city, with great confidence that they could easily take the city, even if the expected enemy numbers were 5 times the actual numbers. They easily passed by the outer parts of the city to great applause from the citizenry, and marched straight to the wall. The buildings for a mile around the central district had been razed to the ground giving the army space to spread out, and charge for the walls, or set up their seige engines. The generals called for a great charge to quickly take the gates, which was when the carnage began, as soon as a majority of the army had made it onto the field, the explosives beneath their feet went off. Huge cascades of dirt, fire, and the dead exploded into the air, killing as many as 3000 men instantly. From there only chaos existed. Ballistas and catapults were launched into the central district and onto the walls, as well as some powerful magics, but nothing could compare to the raining death that came from the cannon and rifle fire that came from on top of the walls. Steel balls bounced along the killing field taking dozens of the heavily grouped soldiers, and the constant stream of bullets almost always found a target. The greatest success came when a force managed to reach the wall and ram their way through one gate, and managed to actually melee and kill a few Scientarians, but once they made it through 100s of bombs were let off from beneath the gate, killing the platoon and sealing the gate with stone. A retreat was called for, but it was then that the final treachery of the day came across. As the majority of the army turned to run, the Bodilch tribe of Dwarves betrayed the Alliance. The Bodilch tribe had long been oppressed as a working class with little to no wealth, and Scientarian emisarries had made contact to gain their allegiance. They were promised prestige in the new Scientarian empire, and took their chance. Using guns given to them before the battle, they managed to devastate the retreating forces who did not realize what was happening until it was too late. The Bodilch managed to escape to within the walls before any action could be taken by the Alliance who was still in full retreat. It is estimated that this first hour of combat claimed over 20,000 alliance lives, and about 20 Scientarians. The morale was extremely low amongst the forces that night and nearly all of the mercenaries had already broken rank and ran. King Rhys Quarvin gave a rousing speech to keep the men in line, and convinced them that the enemy could not have much more ammunition. They would attack again tomorrow, and execute all who had commited such atrocities. A final betrayal of the Bodilch was discovered that night at dinner, when it was discovered that a huge percentage of the food supply had been poisioned. Another 2000 died that night, and the groups mainly targeted were the wealthy and leaders of the Dwarven tribes. It was true that the Scientarians were running out of ammo after that first day, and were somewhat concerned as to what they would do if another gate was breached. Alek noticed this and resolved to make sure that he could have his forces turn back the enemy. Only about 35,000 fighting ready soldiers were still available after accounting for the dead, wounded, and ill from lower level poisoning. The final day of the revolution proper began with a surprising series of events. Three of the gates opened, and about 3000 men and women and children came out. They were welcomed in with open arms, and said they had been freed by the Scientarians so that they would not have to feed them anymore. Once settled well into the army, what is considered one of the sickest tricks of the revolution was perpetrated. All of the released Kurosekans had been implanted by alchemits with bombs and chemical weapons, with contagions of bubonic plague, leprosy, and other horrible diseases ran rampant within the ranks. Before anything else could happen, a final charge was called. Only about 10,000 able bodied fighters were left at this point, and many of them had some form of injury anyway. The Scientarians sent out the close range fighters to take out the last of their enemies. Over a hundred highly mutagenicly enchanced melee fighters, alchemists with mutagenic wings to drop bombs from above, and a large platoon of shotgun wielding soldiers. The majority of Scientarian casualties came from this brawl, about 250, but when over a third of the force had been killed, including the up and coming son of a distinguished and long serving commander, and the King Himself had been torn in half by a hulking Mutant, did the assault finally end. Alek was the undisputed ruler of Kuroseki, and the path to total domination of Gernon was assured. Consolidation of the Empire After Kuroseki and Sephora were taken, and Tear still in Scientarian hands, it had been accepted that the new regime was not going away any time soon. Over the course of the rest of year 0, Adele and Alek conscripted locals into their forces, and began educating people in the new sciences and philosophy of the order. By the end of that first year, over 200,000 soldiers of most of the races were officially part of the scientarians, were skilled in some form of firearm usage or alchemy, and were commited to the cause. The Spice coast resisted somewhat, but quickly surrendered when a large number of spice fields were destroyed to send a message. Coralis fell in line quickly, as the majority of their forces were lost at the Battle of Kuroseki, and they did not want to suffer anymore at the hands of this terrible enemy. By the start of year one, Sephora was the official Capital of the Eastern Scientarian Union, and Kuroseki the Capital of the Western Scientarian Union, both part of the Scientarian Empire. The Dwarven cities of the North and the Calyans in the Southwest took longer to subdue, with minimal clashes with dissenters, but most accepted the new order. By the end of Year 1, almost all of the continent had at least minimal Scientarian involvement. Interestingly, the one completely bloodshed free encounter was the issue that took the longest to resolve. The elves of the Whispering Woods, an ancient people with incredibly strict and conservative ideas on magic and tradition were completely unwilling to submit to the Tellumnar's rule, but the Tellumnars also did not want to actually fight and kill their brethren from the northern forests. The settlement is not public knowledge, but quickly enough, the northern elves submitted to the wishes of the scientarians. The whispering woods would be under the jurisdiction of the eastern union, and would be given more local autonomy. Some rumors say that they reached the settlement so no more would die, while others say the elves were looking for a reconsolidation after the split 400 years ago, but one of the most subversive and controversial claims is that Alek Tellumnar gave some great alchemical secret to the leaders of the north to buy their allegience. Category:Events Category:Wars